Equal-Works

Background

The South East has the lowest International Labour Organisation (ILO) unemployment rate in the UK, yet the region also has the second highest number of people registered as unemployed, second only to London. As the ILO rate considers only those who are 'economically active' (looking for work and available for work) this indicates that a significant number of people in the region are unemployed and do not consider themselves able to work. Breakdown of the statistics shows a high proportion of exclusionary factors among the region's unemployed: disability claimants, long-term unemployed both in the 16-24 age group and those over 50, carers, those in areas of multiple deprivation, and certain ethnic groups. Purely private or public sectors solutions have been insufficient in dealing with the combined issues affecting employment for these groups.

Cultural Shift South East was instigated by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA) to address these barriers, employing a new enterprise and employment framework for excluded groups. A core element of the partnership is the multi-stakeholder participation in service design and delivery, supporting action-based learning and mentoring towards developing entrepreneurial solutions for inclusive employment.

Aims

The Cultural Shift partnership has two strategic aims:

• To model inclusive employment models delivered through independent social enterprises
• To create new protocols for entrepreneurial partnerships between mainstream public sector providers and social enterprises in the South East

Target groups

• Ex-offenders
• Disability claimants
• Long-term unemployed both in the 16-24 age group and those over 50
• Carers
• Those living in areas of multiple deprivation
• Certain ethnic groups

The approach has been undertaken by Cultural Shift South East as a response to research into the nature and potential of social enterprise in the region. This research has become the basis for the regional approach to social enterprise policy development and has identified partnership with public agencies as a key factor in the long-term sustainability of the social enterprise sector as a whole.

The Cultural Shift Programme has worked with 30 direct beneficiaries, which although a seemingly small number, a far greater number of indirect beneficiaries have been included through the 3 main demonstration projects as well as the further 8 demonstration projects facilitated through the Programme. 

The Cultural Shift Programme has identifying the cultural barriers which can inhibit successful public sector sponsorship of social enterprise.

Some of these barriers are as follows:

1. Staff continuity in public sector organisations.
2. A lack of people who understand both the culture of social enterprise and that of the public sector host body and who can provide business advice to social enterprises coming out of the public sector and/or act as intermediaries and translators between the two cultures.
3. Clarity on what market and product the state sponsored social enterprise will be developing.
4. A balance between productivity and margin is crucial to the viability of the social enterprise. This needs to be understood by public sector sponsors, whose expectations of social enterprises can be unrealistic in this context.

Cultural Shift South East has also empowered a number of beneficiaries and offered them the opportunity to undergo personal development training and in a number of cases, helped them to secure a job.